Air pollution is a pressing global challenge, with particularly severe implications in rapidly urbanising cities across Asia and Africa. The degradation of air quality in these regions exacerbates health inequalities, economic burdens, and governance struggles. Despite increasing efforts to measure, regulate, and mitigate air pollution, critical questions remain regarding its effects on public health, the effectiveness of current policies, the expansion of monitoring systems, and the role of social movements in shaping air quality governance.
As part of our research project, this first seminar series brings together academics and activists to explore these themes through case studies spanning India, Iran, Ivory Coast, Mexico, Morocco, Thailand, Senegal, and Vietnam. The series aims to offer a comparative perspective on air pollution governance, technological surveillance, pollution data practices, urbanisation challenges and socio-environmental inequalities across various LMIC cities. A selection of the themes explored are outlined below:
● Expanding Air Quality Surveillance and Its Limits
Several presentations in this series will interrogate the expansion of air quality monitoring systems in a variety of contexts. While governments and international organizations have promoted technological surveillance, concerns persist regarding whether data production translates into effective policies, or regarding the spatial and social inequalities that remain embedded in data production methods. Who benefits from expanded monitoring, and whose air remains unmonitored?
● Air Pollution and Urban Governance
Cities such as Pune and Mexico City will illustrate how air quality governance remains fragmented across municipal, national, and international institutions. Despite air pollution being a highly localized issue, decision-making power often remains concentrated at higher levels, leading to policy misalignment and ineffective urban interventions. Discussions in the seminar will centre around reforms to promote data transparency, coordination between various stakeholders as well as other measures that shall lead to better integration of local perspectives and practices.
● Citizen Mobilization and Advocacy
Beyond institutional action, grassroots movements play a crucial role in advocating for clean air and mitigating socio-spatial inequalities exacerbated by air pollution. For instance, The Thai Clean Air Bill highlights the impact of civilian advocacy in driving legislative reforms and shaping air quality governance. What structural, political, and institutional changes do such movements bring about, and how do they compare to similar advocacy efforts globally.
● Air Pollution and Environmental Justice
Case studies such as Abidjan and Tehran will emphasize how air pollution disproportionately affects marginalized communities and presents unique challenges when it comes to urban cities. Inequalities in exposure, monitoring, and mitigation strategies reveal the need for a justice-oriented approach to air quality policy. How can environmental justice frameworks be integrated into existing governance structures to ensure equitable access to clean air?
● From Local Data to Global Narratives
The global circulation of air pollution data, as seen in Dakar's case, raises important methodological and epistemological questions. How do international organizations and scientific institutions frame the air pollution crisis in the Global South, in what form does their evidence resonate with public perceptions? and what implications does this have for local policy responses?
By addressing these intersecting themes, this seminar series seeks to foster a deeper understanding of the social, political, and technological dimensions of air pollution. Through comparative discussions and knowledge-sharing, we aim to bridge disciplinary and regional divides, equipping participants with new insights to inform research, policy, and activism.
In order to attend the online sessions (Zoom) you need to pre-register with the following link:
A link will be sent to your registered email before each session.
Bertrand Lefebvre | 12-Feb-2025 10:30 CET
India faces a formidable challenge in abating air pollution, particularly in its rapidly urbanizing cities. The smog episodes and the severe degradation of air quality contribute to significant health burdens, economic losses, and reduced life expectancy across the country. Recognizing this crisis, the Indian government has undertaken various initiatives, including the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP), to expand air quality monitoring and improve regulatory frameworks. Through collaborations with the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), State Pollution Control Boards, and research institutions, efforts have been made to enhance surveillance networks to better assess pollution levels and evaluate the effectiveness of policy interventions.
Nevertheless, concerns persist regarding the adequacy and methodology of surveillance expansion. Air quality monitoring networks have grown across cities and regions, but their coverage remains uneven, particularly within large cities. The distribution of monitoring stations often reflects a top-down approach and this expansion does not necessarily translate into improved public awareness or effective decision-making at the local level.
By examining the cases of Hyderabad and Pune, this presentation critically assesses the challenges of expanding regulatory air quality surveillance networks. It explores disparities in monitoring coverage, issues of data integration, and difficulties in maintaining monitoring infrastructure. Additionally, it highlights how air quality data dissemination remains limited in its ability to inform local interventions, often serving national agencies in New Delhi rather than empowering city-level stakeholders or communities.
Ultimately, this presentation underscores the need for a more inclusive and locally relevant approach to air pollution monitoring. Strengthening decentralized decision-making, integrating diverse data sources, and ensuring equitable access to air quality information are crucial to fostering effective and sustainable urban air quality management in Indian cities.
Bertrand Lefebvre is an Associate Professor of Global Health at EHESP School of Public Health (France) and presently on secondment at the French Institute of Pondicherry (India). His research focuses on inequality of exposure to environmental hazards in large cities in Asia and its governance. He is co-coordinating the Globalsmog project with Renaud Hourcade.
Gaoussou Sylla | 26-Feb-2025 10:30 CET
Air pollution is an environmental and public health issue in many cities, both in the North and South. Today, the sources of this pollution are well known, mainly transportation and industrial activities. Other sources, such as dust and biomass combustion, are particularly prevalent in cities in the Global South. Over the last few decades, numerous studies have modelled and mapped various atmospheric pollutants. However, most of these studies have been carried out in northern cities. Among southern cities, those in West Africa (e.g. Abidjan) have been little studied. Yet pollution levels in these cities are often much higher, and on the rise, due to the major changes taking place there, notably accelerated demographic and urbanization trends generating uncontrolled sprawl and exponential growth in the number of cars on the road.
Given the lack of knowledge about air pollution in West African cities, this study of Abidjan aims to model and map a series of atmospheric pollutants (nitrogen dioxide, PM2.5 and PM10). The methodology deployed emphasizes the use of low-cost sensors, an opportunity in African contexts marked by weak continuous monitoring. Extensive data collection was carried out to maximize coverage of the city and the types of urban environments crossed. A total of 920 kilometers were covered in the streets of Abidjan using bicycles equipped with various low-cost devices to measure three air pollutants, record geographical positions, and capture video footage.
The results of air pollutant modelling indicate that the type of road, the nature of the surface (asphalt) and the presence of traffic lights all contribute to increasing pollutant levels. Additive generalized models with an autoregressive term are used to predict pollution levels across the city's entire road network, producing maps. These maps categorize environments into three pollution levels: high, moderate, and low.
Finally, we cross-referenced the modelling and classification results to explore possible inequalities in exposure. Furthermore, during the study, we found that the authorities are implementing pollution control measures, even if these are still far from the expected results.
Gaoussou Sylla, PhD in Urban Studies Specialty. Environment Lecturer and researcher at the Université Alassane Ouattara de Bouaké. Associate researcher at the UNESCO Chair in Anticipation, Foresight and Sustainable Territories (Université Alassane Ouattara Bouaké).
Weenarin Lulitanonda | 12-Mar-2025 10:30 CET
This presentation will provide an overview of the air pollution-induced impact on health and life expectancy in Thailand and of the related economic and social cost implications. The audience will be provided with a systemic overview of some of the key drivers behind this public health crisis, which is ultimately a complex structural issue with implications not just for Thailand but also for the Mekong Sub Region. Finally, audiences will be inspired by what is possible when citizens do work collectively together. Audiences will learn about the grassroots Thai clean air movement, which led to the first citizen-led Thai Clean Air Bill submitted to the Thai Parliament and currently under consideration alongside other drafts for passage into law.
Weenarin is one of the co-founders of the Thailand Clean Air Network (or Thailand CAN), a citizen-driven nonprofit group that includes professionals from multi-disciplinary fields to support policy solutions to the air pollution crisis in Thailand. Thailand CAN has developed the first citizen-driven Clean Air Bill which has been submitted to the Thai Parliament and is one of the draft legislations currently being considered for passage into law. Weenarin has a background in finance and economics with over 25+ years of work experience within the public and private sectors and also with the World Bank Group. She is currently a senior consultant to the International Finance Corporation, the private sector arm of the World Bank, in the area of corporate governance.
Renaud Hourcade | 26-Mar-2025 10:30 CET
A few years ago, the Senegalese media ran front-page stories on a striking piece of information: Dakar ranked as one of the most polluted cities in the world, only second to Delhi, India. The news was both credible and unsettling. Credible because it came from measurements communicated by the WHO, one of the most authoritative institutions in the field. Unsettling because, in their day-to-day experience, the people of Dakar, while routinely exposed to heavy air pollution on the busy streets or when desert sand covers the city, do not generally consider their city as uniformly unbreathable. Was the comparison with a city like Delhi really reasonable? Where do these figures come from and what made them credible? Building from the sociology of the globalization of risks and that of global governance, this contribution will investigate the North-South circulation of models of air quality science and expertise. In a global South context, this invites to critically analyzing the role of international organizations in framing both the scientific questions and the “evidence” deemed necessary to foster public policy making. We will also argue that understanding quantification processes lead us to pay close attention to the way figures are produced, as producing environmental measurements in the South often means working in a degraded economic setting, in which the institutional, material and financial resources required for quantification are rarely assured.
Renaud Hourcade is a CNRS senior researcher in political science (Sciences Po Bordeaux - France). He is interested in the comparative study of public policy processes across a variety of contexts. A co-coordinator of the Globalsmog project, he has conducted fieldworks about air pollution politics/policies in Senegal.
https://www.centreemiledurkheim.fr/notre-equipe/renaud-hourcade/
Madhura Joglekar | 9-Apr-2025 10:30 CET
India faces the heavy burden of air pollution and contains some cities with the poorest air quality in the world. However, apart from Delhi, air pollution in Indian cities is less studied from a socio-economic perspective.
Cities, since colonial times, have been restricted by higher levels of government, and independent India too retained most of the power and financial ability at the state and centre. Despite some reforms, and efforts at scaling back the state, power in cities is fragmented in the hands of several actors including the city administration, bureaucrats and elected representatives, NGOs, property developers, and to some extent resident welfare organizations.
Using the example of Pune, one of the non-attainment cities under the National Clean Air Program (NCAP) This qualitative research attempts adds to a growing body of literature on the fragmentation of power and governance in Indian cities through the lens of air pollution. Despite two city based action plans in two decades, measures for air quality improvement have not proven effective. Air pollution comes from multiple sources, depends on a complex range of regional factors and needs sustained, coordinated efforts at airshed level. A city-based approach for air quality improvement has not proved effective due to the multiplicity of stakeholders and fragmentation of power at city level. Further, lack of funds and capacity of the urban local bodies means that they largely act as implementing agencies for national directives.
Madhura Joglekar is a PhD student at IISER Pune, with an interest in urban governance and environmental issues.
Loup Deladerriere | 16-Apr-2025 10:30 CET
Tehran and Mexico City are two capitals and megacities among the world's very polluted cities. However, a range of public policies were developed at different levels in both countries and their ‘capital-megacity’ from the 1970s onwards, and were strengthened over the period 1990-2000. The communication proposes to present the process of institutionalization of air in Tehran and Mexico City and its consequences. We will analyze the development of knowledge, techniques and policies to reduce air pollution in the two capital cities. Even if the international context has played an important role, we observed important dynamics at national, regional and municipal scales. Various institutions, norms, policies and tools have been developed to monitor, control, reduce the mobile and stationary sources. Although air quality improved during the last decades, we analyzed that air pollution and its governance transform the cities and contribute to various and complex socio-spatial inequalities. Spatial and social margins are especially vulnerable in the context of new forms of urban governance. It also calls into question the development of protean resistances. The presentation is based on the results of a Doctoral thesis and research fieldworks in Tehran (2018-2019) and Mexico City (2021-2022). The presentation also wants to expose the limits of the study and open the discussions with other research in the Global South.
Loup Deladerriere is a geographer, PhD, currently post-doctoral researcher at Paris-Saclay University.
Celia Mir Álvarez | 7-May-2025 10:30 CET
Air pollution is responsible for 7 million annual deaths and is a particular concern in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), where 90% of this mortality is concentrated. This issue is frequently framed as a health concern by international actors such as the World Health Organization and the World Bank. Similarly, indications are that air pollution usually settles as a public problem in a given location after the alarm is sounded by health experts or after a severe pollution episode leads to important and immediate health impacts, such as the London smog of 1952. However, despite their initial involvement, public health professionals rarely play a leading role in air quality management at national and local levels today. Why is this the case? While some scholars have noted this shift, few have examined the underlying reasons that may explain it.
This presentation aims to further investigate this observation by tracing the activities of public health actors in managing the air pollution problem in Morocco. I will explore whistleblowing by health experts in the country over 20 years ago, the actors that held key governance positions in the ensuing air quality policies, the influence of transnational public health organizations (like the WHO) in health agenda-setting in the country, and surveillance capabilities for air pollution-related illnesses. In doing so, I will shed light on some of the infrastructural, institutional, and political barriers that may explain the weak role of the health sector in air quality management in the country today. Finally, I will conclude by engaging with ongoing discussions, which to date have been limited, on the role of public and global health actors in air quality management – and environmental health more broadly – in LMICs, at all levels of governance.
Celia Mir Álvarez is preparing a PhD in Science and Technology Studies at Université Paris Cité, which she is now concluding. She is a member of the Cermes3 lab (Research center for medicine, science, health, mental health, and society). She explores public and global health narratives around air quality management in the Global South, which usually revolve around monitoring and data collection, and studies how these narratives have shaped Morocco's air quality management choices.
Roberto Rodríguez | 21-May-2025 10:30 CET
Why despite its urban effects some problems are only tackled at the national level? What leads those issues to get into the city’s agenda? How do national and local agendas couple? Using the case of air quality policy in Mexico City, this presentation addresses these questions. Using institutionalist and cognitive approaches, it analyzes the changes in four governance dimensions – urban, horizontal, vertical, and international. The main argument is that the problem’s original framing as a centralized issue kept it from reaching the local agenda, leaving interactions at the national level. Institutional and political changes involved more actors, which through coordinative discourses redefined the issue, making air quality the cities’ problem. While the processes leading to the issue reframing were context-specific, direct attributions on the issue had little to do on the agenda coupling process. Throughout the problem re-definition process, the competences on air quality remained mostly unchanged. Rather, what brought air pollution to the local arena was the combination of structural political and institutional changes, local politics and pollution crises as focusing events, triggering the mobilization of the civil society in Mexico City.
Roberto Rodríguez holds a PhD in Political Science from Sciences Po. Currently he works as a postdoctoral researcher at the Laboratory for Interdisciplinary Evaluation of Public Policies (LIEPP) of Sciences Po Paris, developing comparative research on climate adaptation policies, green workforce and policy innovation in cities. During his PhD, Roberto developed a thesis comparing air quality and climate policies in Paris and Mexico City. Before joining Sciences Po, he worked at the National Council for Science and Technology where he directed a program to employ top-performing young researchers in Mexico. He was also the national delegate to the OECD for the Committee for Science and Technology Policy, as well as member of the organization’s Group of National Experts on Science and Technology Indicators.
Marie Lan Nguyen Leroy | 4-Jun-2025 10:30 CET
Hanoi is heavily polluted. Air pollution contributes to over 6,700 premature deaths annually in the capital. Each resident loses an average of 2.49 years of life expectancy due to PM2.5 exposure (LL, HUPH, VNU-UET, 2021).
Awareness of air pollution is recent in Vietnam, but Hanoi has taken the first steps towards setting up an air quality monitoring system. However, data quality needs to be strengthened, with better coordination among various monitoring efforts. Recent steps have been made to reduce pollution, such as banning charcoal cookstoves and burning agricultural waste, but more coherent and far-reaching policies are needed.
This presentation will analyze the implementation of the city's air pollution control strategy, through a multi-stakeholder dialogue. International donors such as the World Bank are involved, supporting initiatives to manage air quality and assess emission sources. Various NGOs, universities, and the private sector are also supporting city authorities in the definition of their policies.
Given the difficulties of data transparency, coordination between stakeholders, and the lack of public resources to protect air quality, to what extent and under what conditions is this strategy being implemented?
Marie Lan Nguyen Leroy has a PhD in public law from Panthéon-Assas Paris II University. She is a consultant for Paris Region Expertise - Vietnam, a cooperation organization between Paris Region and the Hanoi People's Committee. She is in charge of the Quality of Life - Quality of City program, which integrates environmental issues such as air quality, waste management, and sustainable urban management into city policies.
Rémi de Bercegol | 25-Jun-2025 10:30 CET
Using the case of the regulation of electronic waste in India, this contribution looks at the relocation of unauthorised recycling activities to less controlled areas, making the exploitation of the poor workers who dismantle them a little more invisible. Given the globalised nature of the sector, this e-waste trade has been widely described as a global environmental injustice akin to ‘garbage imperialism’. As a counterpoint to these discourses,other analyses have also revealed the existence in the South of highly dynamic informal repair and recycling economies. This is where the ambivalence of this controversial sector lies, between rejection by some and opportunity for others. Following on from this work, we propose to rethink electronic waste flows at a more intra-regional level in order to examine the new socio-spatial forms of injustice, and opportunities, that latest developments in the regulation of the recycling sector are creating. In India, the introduction of reforms designed by and for the large groups in the organised sector has rendered the work of a multitude of small informal labour illegal. This artisanal recycling, based on low operating costs, has nevertheless not stopped but is now spreading clandestinely to the outskirts of the cities, and especially in in rural areas, where a workforce that can be bent to mercy is available and where health controls are virtually non-existent, creating new local forms of environmental injustice.
Dr. Rémi de Bercegol is a CNRS research fellow, affiliated in France to PRODIG (UMR 8586, Paris). He has a doctorate in urban planning from LATTS (research group on technology, territories and societies) at Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées, Université Paris Est, France. His current research focuses on socio-technical transition of basic urban services (water, sanitation, waste, energy) in India (as well as in East Africa and South East Asia), and more broadly urban dynamics.